Attorney General Bonta Issues Statement on Trinity Health's Decision to Leave Madera County Residents In Need

Trinity Health, without any good faith effort to engage, announced recently that it would be abandoning the sale of Madera Community Hospital 

OAKLAND — California Attorney General Rob Bonta today issued the following statement after the Trinity Health Corporation failed to move forward on an agreement to purchase Madera Community Hospital. The Attorney General conditionally approved the sale of the hospital last week. 

“I am deeply disappointed that Trinity Health has chosen to leave vulnerable communities in need by walking away from this deal,” said Attorney General Bonta. “The minimal conditions we set on the sale would have kept the hospital’s services affordable and accessible, and prioritized people’s health and safety. These baseline conditions would merely require Trinity to use its best efforts to act in good faith and keep the hospital open for patients who relied on it for critical and lifesaving services. Instead, Trinity refused to meet even these minimal conditions and chose to callously walk away. Madera County’s residents deserve better." 

Under the terms of the conditional approval set for the sale, Attorney General Bonta required, among other things, that Trinity:

• Use best efforts in good faith to maintain services, including the hospital, ER, and rural clinics, at the Madera Community Hospital for 5 years, which allowed for flexibility while ensuring that services could not be cut off on a whim;
• Accept flexible price caps to ensure continued affordability for Madera residents while still allowing for the necessary price increases as part of the turnaround of the hospital;
• Ensure continued certification of the hospital as a Medi-Cal and Medicare facility;
• Provide, as a general matter, charity care, financial assistance to patients, and community benefits;
• Comply with nondiscrimination rules in the provision of healthcare services; and
• Provide emergency reproductive healthcare services, notice, and information to the public about nonemergency reproductive healthcare not provided, as well as information about alternative licensed providers and transport.

These conditions were set to protect the communities in Madera County and their access to affordable healthcare. Many Madera County residents are from lower-income communities who rely on Medicare, Medi-Cal, charity care, and financial assistance that were placed as conditions, as well as on the essential services provided by the hospital and the rural clinics. These minimal conditions were necessary because without them, the communities could not be assured of even basic essential services, as they could be shut down at any time. Any deal without those conditions would make the hospital one that would not serve or help the community. In addition, the conditions allowed for the flexibility necessary for any turnaround plan.

More details on Attorney General Bonta’s conditional approval of the sale can be found here.